Assimilation
by readerofasaph
Summary: Obligatory D2 backstory fanfic detailing how Jackal came to Rikkai, and how Yukimura persuaded Marui to play doubles with Jackal. NB. Due to the first half of this being written before 40.5 came out, contradicts some known canon information.
1. Chapter 1

The new student is bald like an egg. Not that eggs are bald, just that the tanned contours of his head are strikingly embryonic in shape, and as Bunta stares at them he has to bite down on his gum to keep from chuckling out loud.

The teacher glances at him suspiciously, which is unfair. Two-thirds of the time it is Niou who precipitates disruption, and two-thirds of the time she does look at Niou first, although it's not always the right two-thirds. But this time she is looking at Bunta because Sanada is also glaring in his direction, more out of annoyance rather than suspicion. Bunta is fairly sure Sanada isn't psychic the way Yanagi and Yukimura are, but he does a pretty good imitation of it sometimes.

Academics are academics, and lie outside of tennis club jurisdiction – even if it occasionally feels as if Yukimura owns their souls – so Bunta cheerfully ignores his teammate, tucks his chewing gum into the left corner of his mouth, and focuses on the newcomer, who is dark and tall and smiles as if he would rather be somewhere on the other side of the world.

Or perhaps the other side of the Pacific Ocean. The name is Kuwahara – "please call me Jackal" – a few students try out the name on their tongues: _ja-ke-ru_ - and a girl sitting near the front door starts giggling. It's like an animal exhibit, Bunta thinks, and recalls last Sunday, when he took his brothers to the zoo. Only extreme self-control and the conviction that good food should not be wasted kept him ramming the sharp end of an ice cream cone into their throats.

He blows out his gum, pops it again, and waves his right arm enthusiastically. Let him sit next to me, he says, nodding at the seat on his left, which has been vacant ever since Tsuzaki lost patience with Bunta's habit of affixing chewed gum to the closest available piece of furniture.

The teacher still looks suspicious but the relief wins out; Jackal Kuwahara,still smiling awkwardly and carrying enough stationery to last him the rest of his junior high career, is directed to the fifth desk in the fourth row from the back. The entire class is still staring but not as brazenly. Bunta's protection is social acceptance, but Bunta's protection is tennis club protection, and while the Three take a minimal interest in school politics, their reputation echoes all the way up to the Board of Trustees and back again. Nobody is interested in being the target of Yukimura's cold, cold fury.

The new boy reaches the desk. His face is drawn tightly together the way people sometimes do when they do not want to look nervous, but his hands are large, brown and steady. On opposing sides of the classroom, Sanada looks thoughtful and Niou looks neutral. Bunta ignores them and grins at Jackal's uncertain expression.

"_Shikuyoro_! I'm Marui Bunta," he says brightly. "Some people call me a genius, but you can call me Bunta."

Teeth often look white against dark skin, but Jackal's teeth are truly white, the color of refined sugar. The sincerity of his grin catches Bunta off-guard.

#

That afternoon Jackal joins the tennis club. By the time they run their twentieth lap and Bunta's lungs are screaming for rest, reprieve, oxygen, Jackal is barely breaking a sweat. While they are completing their stretches, Renji quietly takes position behind them; the Three have noticed.

Bunta drags Jackal out for a practice match at first opportunity. Jackal's groundstrokes are fast and careful, his mistakes rare, his game all solidity. A defensive player, Bunta thinks - what a rare thing at Rikkai. Yanagi's playing style is not defensive so much as it is freaky; Sanada's tennis is merely perfect, invulnerable in every aspect.

By the time they reach 2-1 half the people on the courts are watching. Bunta's popularity holds in the club, as it does everywhere else except at home, but he doesn't kid himself that he's the one attracting the spectators. Club members enjoy boasting about the Miracle Skills - in the same proprietary way they used to say, 'our first-year regulars' – but they became a subject of ennui a long time ago. If people are not equally blasé about Yukimura, it is because of the way he shatters his limits, every time he hits the seeming end of his potential.

Yukimura is currently watching the match with a narrow-eyed, considering look. Bunta has no time to look at the sidelines – if he doesn't pay attention he _will_ lose – but it doesn't take great imagination, to visualise the speculative gleam in Yukimura's eye as he turns to speak to Sanada. Sanada's brow will knit as he replies, and Renji will stay silent, noticing everything from Jackal's topspin to the number of Bunta's unforced errors. It doesn't take Niou's mind to foresee the Three's actions; as individuals they are unpredictable, but as one entity their movements follow consistent patterns.

At 6-4, Bunta is totally exhausted. "Please go away and let me die," he mutters at the shadow that falls across his curled-up body on the bench. Yukimura laughs. It is the laugh that makes people want to think of metaphors like windchimes and water splashing past rock and, if you are really observant, the glint of a switchblade, but it is 4:30 and Bunta is _hungry_ and practice is not over yet.

"The Regulars are having ball drills," Yukimura says. "Come on, get up, or I won't be able to make excuses for you."

As if Yukimura makes excuses for anyone. Bunta pushes himself upright, stretching tired muscles. "Where did Jackal go?" he asks.

"With Niou and Yagyuu. They're having practice games with Akaya."

"Is that how it is?"

Yukimura looks amused. "Don't make assumptions." There are months to go before the fall ranking tournament. "You weren't holding back in that match, were you."

Bunta turns his head and looks blearily up at Yukimura. "Why should I do that? Losing to pre-regulars isn't part of the plan."

"Well, that's good to know." Some of Yukimura's smiles are maddeningly elusive, but this one is as unmistakable as any other.

_Try harder_, it says. _Play better._ Somewhere inside, Bunta instantly acquiesces, sharpens his tennis resolve.

He doesn't know how to do anything else.

#

Tennis swallows Jackal and Bunta up. It seeps through all their conversations and classes; in one week, Bunta learns more about Gustavo Kuerten than he ever wants to know.

"Let's talk about, like, Brazilian food or something," he says, after their fifth (extremely interesting, but repetitiveness is repetitiveness) discussion of the French Open and the demands of clay court surfaces. Jackal smiles and tells him about _feijoada_ and roast suckling pig, guarana and _doce de leite_. Bunta's stomach grumbles.

"When I save up the money, I am going on a world culinary tour," he says with perfect conviction. "And you are going to show me around South America."

"I only know Brazil," Jackal says, showing his white teeth. "If you want a Latin American tour guide, you'll need someone who speaks Spanish."

That's right, Bunta thinks, remembering an old World History class on colonization, Brazil was a Portuguese colony. It seems so strange, he says, to be a conquered nation, to speak a language that doesn't belong to you.

"Don't Japanese people write with Chinese characters?"

That's different, Bunta says indignantly. We weren't conquered, we just _borrowed_.

"If you have to borrow something, it obviously belongs to someone else," Jackal says reasonably. Bunta clicks his teeth in annoyance. He takes revenge by correcting two-thirds of Jackal's _kanji_ in violet ink, that afternoon in Japanese class.

A few days later he notices that Jackal is gradually becoming fascinated with Akaya. This is not unusual. Everyone notices the brat at some point, and the Three have never stopped watching him.

"Why isn't he a regular yet?" Jackal asks Bunta in surprise. "He seems stronger than you are." It is not meant to be insulting. This is the language of Rikkai: balanced, objective assessment, and the endless reminder to play better tennis. Bunta sighs and pops his gum.

"The brat played Sanada in the first match of the April ranking tournament," he says. "Then he played Renji in his second match."

Jackal has yet to see any of the Three play a match, but he's got eyes. "Both of them?"

"After that, Yukimura got so interested he invited Akaya to an unofficial match." 'Interested' might not be the right word to use. Bunta trusts Yukimura to deploy his ruthless edge only when necessary, but he had his doubts that day.

"They were really good matches." Bunta watches the thoughtful expression on Jackal's face. "Really good. First time I ever saw Sanada use the Ka."

This precipitates a discussion of the Fuurinkazan, progressing to Renji's Kamaitachi and then the Laser Beam. Eventually Bunta is reluctantly led to discuss the Miracle Skills.

"This school is very impressive," Jackal says, when Bunta has finished explaining the topspin on the Techuu Ate. "You have many strong players."

Bunta shrugs. "We're the current national champions."

Jackal has a little frown on his forehead. It reminds Bunta strangely of Akaya, and he is puzzled by the resemblance until he recognizes the expression for what it is: determination. "And you're on the Regulars this year, right? How does someone get on the team?"

Bunta is in dire need of friends who are neither tennis-obsessed nor compulsively single-minded. It's tragic, that the people he likes best always turn out to be both.

"Get Yukimura to like you," he says, spitting out his gum and sticking it on the adjacent tree trunk. "Playing good tennis helps."

"Come again?" Jackal glances at the saliva-wet circle of gum. He looks unsure whether to be amused or perplexed; Bunta resists the urge to sigh.

"The main ranking tournament is held in April," he explains. "Everyone participates in that one. The September tournament is for the pre-regulars only; it's used to fill the regular spots that the third-years leave empty when they retire." Bunta can see Jackal mulling over the information, processing numbers in his head.

"That means that there'll be three places, right? One for Akaya- and," Jackal looks up. "Niou's the only other player who's good enough."

Bunta pulls out another pack of gum, unpeels the silver wrapper. "Like I said, get Yukimura to like you."

Within the tennis club there is only one way to gain Yukimura's affections. Bunta thinks about all the things he could tell this white-toothed foreigner, his new friend, his probable teammate. He opens his mouth to speak and shuts it immediately.

Sooner or later, Jackal will understand.

#

Bunta is paired regularly with Renji in doubles only because other combinations are worse; Yukimura has been spotted before, watching their matches with a not-quite wince that mirrors Bunta's feelings – and Renji's as well, he suspects. The fact that they are undefeated in tournaments only aggravates the situation, in some ways.

"You think too much," Bunta accuses. They are putting away their racquets after winning the second round of Kantou; Renji's expression is rueful, in a neutral-Renji sort of way.

"Try to be reasonable, Bunta."

We have to be reasonable about so many other things, Bunta wants to say, homework and family and piano exams. Isn't it possible to be a little bit unreasonable about tennis? But Renji is also the Three, despite being Renji.

He stares down at his tennis bag. After a moment, Renji's voice breaks the silence. "Are you planning to come this Saturday?"

It is several moments before he remembers Yukimura's invitation weeks ago, to attend his sister's school fair. Bunta had long forgotten about it until Renji's reminder, but of course Renji knew that he would forget.

"Masaharu and Hiroshi have already promised to be there."

"What about Jackal?" Bunta asks.

Renji opens his eyes wide. "Would you like us to invite him?"

Only if you really mean it, Bunta says, and this time Renji smiles.

"That's not a decision for us to make."

Bunta wants to ask him what the heck he means. But Nishiki and the third-years are approaching, necessitating an end to the conversation; Yukimura and Sanada appear a second later, still wearing their watchful battle-gazes.

It is not until evening that Bunta recalls that Renji rarely answers a question with a question - not unless he truly wants to make a point, and only when he cannot think of a better way to do so.


	2. Chapter 2

It's a recurring dream, but doesn't always happen in the same way each time; this is the version Bunta remembers, pieced together from several variations:

He's hurtling down a waterfall, headfirst; it's taller than Niagara and Tokyo Tower and any other comparison his dream-brain can immediately supply. Drifting mist shrouds any possible view of the bottom, but the general impression is that there's a long, long way to go. And he's still accelerating. Hitting terminal velocity is a distinct possibility.

He never actually experiences it in the dream, but he knows exactly how he got here; there was, he remembers, a cliff involved. The seven of them, and Yukimura telling them to jump. Bunta said _how high_, Akaya had already thrown himself off the edge, and Sanada and Renji stood there with arms folded across their respective chests, steady-posed, ready to fall together, but not until Yukimura himself did.

Bunta never sees the end of that particular drama – the three and their eternal deadlock, although he'd be placing bets on Sanada to break it – he's not the first to leap but not last either, competing with Hiroshi for second place. Niou delays obedience merely on principle, but even then he's not far behind. If Bunta twists his neck to look up he can see the silver hair and over-thin limbs speeding downwards also, bare metres above himself. It's a shared activity but strangely lonely, this communal falling. Somewhat like playing team tennis. In the end you fall and you die, you lose, on your own.

He always manages to wake up before he crashes, deeply regretting the last packet of chocolate biscuits consumed before bedtime. If there _is_ a crash coming. He's never seen any evidence of it. Maybe it's just an eternal falling, this game of tennis and victory and Rikkai that Yukimura has asked them to play.

Maybe life itself is an eternal falling. He fixes himself a midnight snack before he can damage his own mind by getting too philosophical.

#

Yukimura to all appearances, is a better older brother than Bunta is without having to expend half the effort that Bunta does. It's partly attributable, perhaps, to little sisters being easier to handle than little brothers, or possibly just _everyone_ being easier to handle for Yukimura.

Whatever the reason is, it takes Yukimura a scant five minutes to assure his sister of his brotherly support and enduring affection, leaving the eight of them with the rest of the morning and school fair coupons worth thousands of yen to kill. Akaya is looking bored already.

Niou tweezes a strand of curly hair with his thumb and index finger, making Akaya squawk. "Come on _chibi_, I'll take you to the shooting game."

"No, you won't." Sanada scowls. "I'll take him."

There's some accusation and mistrust in his tone, the implication that the combination of Niou and Akaya set loose in an elementary school fair is liable to bring teachers, property damage, and the wrath of judicial authorities down in torrents; but maybe the real message behind this is Sanada's need to be needed. Niou shrugs as if to say, _what difference will it make?_ Yukimura directs a Look at them, and then a sidelong glance at Jackal.

"I think _you_ should take Akaya," he says.

Akaya stares at Jackal with xenophobic mistrust and a touch of curiosity. Jackal smiles and holds out a hand.

They disappear into a moving throng of young parents and candy-munching schoolchildren and Bunta tries to figure out why Yukimura just got rid of their two newcomers, without much success.

Well, in truth he's not trying very hard to analyse the situation, since within about fifteen seconds he spots food.

_Takoyaki_, to be precise; sold at a lone colourful stall that is inexplicably customerless despite giving off the most amazing wafting fragrance Bunta has had the privilege of smelling in weeks – seafood, green onion, _oil_.

He takes five steps in the direction of the stall before he remembers that he is completely penniless and couponless.

"Erm," he says, stopping and turning around. "Yukimura."

Three minutes later he's got his mouth open wide and Yukimura is finger-feeding him him balls of grease and batter from a white paper bag. Bunta's tongue and teeth are a slick mess of mayonaise and salt-sweet-flavourful _pleasure_. He chews, swallows, makes various approving sounds.

Niou's rolling his eyes. "Get a room."

But Yukimura's eyes are gleaming as if he's having fun and Bunta definitely is, so clearly all Niou-statements are peripheral and to be ignored in favour of _takoyaki_-bliss. Actually, the rest of the world is quite peripheral at the moment.

At least until seven octopus balls in, when Yukimura asks, "Would you like to play doubles with Jackal?"

The food freezes in his mouth, mid-chew.

He's suddenly conscious of everyone around them: Renji's there, and Sanada's watching them with that considering look he uses at tournaments, and Hiroshi and Niou are two metres away and talking about mathematics class but probably they're paying attention anyway. Niou definitely is, the bastard.

Bunta tries to talk with his mouth full, but what comes out is a, "Mmmmpfh – waunngh," and Yukimura grins.

"Am I allowed to take that as a yes?"

#

By the time they're back at after-school practice on Monday Akaya and Jackal are apparently the best of friends, having a built a relationship based on tennis, disenfranchisement, and Akaya borrowing Jackal's money. Bunta has words to say about that, mostly along the lines of how impolite brats need to _find their own financial suppliers_ and not co-opt Bunta's.

He watches the pre-regulars as they do their warm-ups, Akaya using one arm to hold the other behind his neck in a long stretch and chattering to Jackal simultaneously. Probably outlining his Master Plan to be the World's Best Tennis Player. Jackal actually looks interested.

Later all the club members get together for ball drills and Bunta finds himself standing on the sidelines with with _kouhai_ on one side, New Foreign Friend on the other. Renji's serving on Court A, Niou is returning, and the only thing preventing the entire club from watching them is the presence of Nishiki-sempai on Court C.

Renji serves classically, precise and very fast. Niou dashes forward three steps, and unleashes the Kamaitachi.

By the end of five balls and a conspicuous succession of special techniques (Laser Beam, Utsusemi, some horrible imitation of Tsunawatari that is _nothing like the way Bunta does it_) Renji's face has that unnatural control that suggests that that he is a little bit (or very) annoyed. Akaya snickers, and Jackal's expression wobbles, as if he isn't quite sure whether to be impressed or unimpressed.

"Does he ever play seriously?" he asks.

Despite Yukimura's continual lessoning, Bunta has never quite understood this important divide between playing seriously and not. Perhaps one is just born with it, like Akaya or Sanada, and no amount of trying can ever get you there. Bunta has long settled for simply being able to _win_. Yukimura has never complained.

Due to some strange tangential path his thoughts are currently taking, he's moved to catch Jackal's attention and tell him about the time in first year when Yukimura made Niou run three hundred laps around the courts in the dead of winter. Yukimura wasn't captain or vice-captain then (still isn't, although even the third-years have trouble remembering this), and Niou was trying to quit the club, never mind trying to make the regulars or supporting Yukimura's three-year-plan. The mechanisms by which Yukimura succeeded in making Niou listen to him are a mystery to even Hiroshi, but there's a consensus that it involved four hours of running for Niou while Yukimura stood there, jacket across his shoulders, and watched. At sunset a torrential rain came down on the both of them and changed nothing except the aftermath: Yukimura came down with influenza, Niou was fine.

Jackal listens patiently and then frowns, as if he's trying to work out what it all means. Bunta can't even begin to answer that. What does Rikkai mean, what does Yukimura _mean_, anyway? If Niou knew the answer he probably wouldn't be here.

Bunta has never met anyone like Yukimura. (Admittedly, he's never met anyone like Sanada or Niou either, but their contributions to his existence have been somewhat less life-changing.) If there's one thought he carries from these two years, though, it's that tennis for him is not going to stretch on forever and ever, the way he imagined as a kid; back in the days when he really did think he was a genius, before he learnt what genius was, and its insanity.

It's a thought that still hurts sometimes, when he realises he'll never be _really good_ at tennis ever again.

A looming figure steps in front of them. Sanada, frowning from beneath his baseball cap. Jackal blanches; probably because to him Sanada's expression still looks disapproving, even though Bunta's told him repeatedly that it's just Sanada's normal expression.

"Can you come an hour early to practice tomorrow?" He directs the question at Jackal, but his gaze at both of them, and when Bunta calculates the time he wants to sputter. One hour early, that's a _quarter to six AM_, which entails waking up at a time so early Bunta's brain can barely compute it, and--

-- Jackal nods readily, which all in all is quite predictable really.

"Whatever for?" demands Bunta. If his highly valuable sleep is to be interrupted he wants there to be a reason for it, although if Sanada's involved it's unlikely to be a good reason.

Sanada gives him a patented deliberate imperturbable Sanada expression. "For a match."

#

Jackal is on his second bottle of mineral water and doesn't seem anywhere close to replenishing the sweat that's coming off his head and neck and dampened skin. He's not breathing hard at all, a feat that would be awe-inspiring were it not for the fact that Sanada is duplicating it, on the opposite side of the court. (Still is awe-inspiring, actually. It's not as if Sanada counts as human.)

"I've never," Bunta says, and then closes his mouth before trying again: "That is the longest single set I've ever seen played on school grounds."

A hundred and five minutes, to be exact, long enough to completely disrupt morning practice. Yukimura actually looked irritated about that.

Jackal attempts a grin, but his mouth doesn't quite make it there. Fair enough. He _has_ just lost to the Zan, after all.

Akaya, the only person in known history to individually lose to each of the Three in a single day, comes over and makes some tangled statement about Jackal's defensive play that is the backhanded Akaya way of both commiserating and giving a compliment. Despite Akaya's obvious inability to communicate clearly, Jackal seems to get the message; his eyes light up, his face softens into a small smile. Funny how people always manage to hear what Akaya means and not just what he says.

Bunta clicks his tongue and remembers first-year, September (playing Yukimura after the Newcomer tournament, losing losing _losing_ so bad it was like a lesson in the meaning of the word despair); first-year, October (Sanada, Hiroshi; a twenty-minute match); first-year, December (nobody outside the Three knows how long it took, or how Renji defeated Niou, but only that it happened). And then April of second-year, of course, but no one will ever forget that.

"So, what did you think of your initiation?" he asks, when Akaya finally gets bored and pisses off. It's a bit of an abrupt question, but Jackal, he thinks, is beginning to get it now.

Jackal stares at him, a gradually dawning realisation settling on his face, and then he _does_ grin.

#

After that the only real question is that of Bunta's cooperation, which he feels compelled to withhold for several weeks just on principle. Renji offered him a _choice_, after all – although who truly believes in free will, when Yukimura's involved?

He's always thought of himself as a singles player, right from the start. An entire tournament season of doubles, unrelenting doubles, and the knowledge that third-year will be the same has scarcely done anything to change that. What kind of person instinctively thinks of himself as a doubles player, anyway? (Renji, his mind supplies, but Renji's _weird_.)

And then, doubles with Jackal--

-- could work, actually; he concedes this point to the Three, as well as their impeccable collective eye for spotting tennis ability. He tests it out by dragging Jackal, Niou, and Hiroshi to a local tennis club one Saturday morning.

The other two win the first four games before Bunta gets used to _not having to watch for Renji's gamemaking._

Once this point is established, he and Jackal draw it out to a 4-6 loss.

Niou shakes his head. "Just give in already." There's mockery in his tone, the usual cultivated disdain that colours his expressions everytime he refers to what he describes as Bunta's inevitable habit of rolling over and baring his throat, where Yukimura is involved; Bunta merely shrugs. It's not as if Niou has a leg to stand on as far as _that's_ concerned.

Jackal clears his throat and Hiroshi politely looks at him, the rest following suit. "I think that went well."

After that it feels like a betrayal of Jackal to keep being stubborn, especially when playing doubles with him is this fun (might even be more fun than singles, he thinks momentarily, and then clamps down on that idea, horrified.), so instead of outright refusal he takes up procrastination for another two, three weeks. He'll talk to Renji after Kantou, he decides, or maybe – when Regionals end without anything changing in his cultivated apathy – when summer vacation comes. It's such a Niou thing, to delay cooperation for the sake of delay; Bunta knows he can't keep it up forever. He can't even keep it up for very long.

In the end Yukimura beats him to it, as usual, with a special Friday afternoon round of doubles matches between the second and third years (completely unprecedented and justified only by Yukimura's irresistible persuasion directed at the coach). First up, Yagyuu-Kuwahara versus Sugiyama-Mochizuki.

After the first three points, Bunta is twitching. By the end of the first game, he and Niou are exchanging overt looks of pain as well as telepathic thoughts about wasted strength, stupid pride (or possibly just aggressiveness, in the case of Hiroshi), and inability to think of a sneaky strategy to _win_.

"I mean," Bunta snaps his gum, "is that not the most utterly pathetic waste of superior ability you've ever seen in your entire life? Except maybe for that Hyoutei captain during the Kantou finals, that was pretty disastrous."

"Mmhmm." Niou nods. "They're going to lose. Yukimura won't be pleased."

The gum falls out of Bunta's mouth. He stares at Niou with an oh-crap-he'd forgotten-Yukimura's-complex-about-good-players-playing-bad-tennis kind of feeling. "Eh, Jackal's not really ready for that kind of scolding as yet."

"Of course he isn't. So don't just stand there, do something about it." Niou affects a bored expression. "It's high time we moved on to something else. Our strategist hasn't talked about anything interesting in weeks."

Bunta spends the next ten minutes trying to think of witty and horrible things to say to Niou before he gives up at 0-3 and stalks onto the court, muttering under his breath.

Hiroshi raises an eyebrow. Bunta says, "Oh just let me _take_ over," and takes position without waiting for an answer.

Hiroshi leaves the court without saying anything else, he's going to be pissy about it for days but Bunta doesn't care about that.

On the coach's bench, Yukimura's probably smiling that smile which on any other person would be a self-satisfied smirk but Bunta doesn't care about _that_ either.

#

He has to pair up with Renji to win Nationals, but with the knowledge that he'll never have to do it again resting on his mind, it's actually quite a pleasant experience.

#

"It's a good place to play tennis," Jackal says, two months later when they're both regulars and playing doubles on an almost-daily basis. (before the winter. Oh, before the winter. But they don't know that yet.)

He means Rikkai. Bunta doesn't really have to think about it before he agrees _yes, it is, it's always been_.


End file.
